The invention relates to a holding device for use in assembling mechanical members, which is useful e.g. when assembling an automotive vehicle, in preliminarily holding a part which is relatively large in size and requires much labor in mounting, such as a bumper and a rear lamp, onto a body of the vehicle.
Conventionally, in mounting a rear lamp on a body of an automotive vehicle, as shown in FIG. 4, a fixture member 30 is mounted on the body beforehand, and then a rear lamp stay 31 mounted on the rear position lamp is caused to engage with claws 32 of the fixture member 30 so that the stay 31 is held by the claws 32. However, the fixture member 30 has almost no degree of freedom to the inclination of the rear lamp relative to the body. Therefore, when a rear position lamp having distortion in its formed shape is to be mounted on the body, it has been required to carry out mounting work while correcting a deviation in the positional relationship between the members to be assembled, by hands of workers.
Accordingly, the step of mounting a rear position lamp on a body cannot dispense with manual labor, because even if it is attempted to automate the assembling process, it is very difficult for a robot, which performs an accurate motion in a predetermined and unadaptable manner, of an automatic assembly machine, to effect the mounting work, due to possible distortion in the formed shape of the rear lamp and dimensional and/or positional errors in assembly of the body, which has hitherto made it impossible to automatically mount the rear lamp on the body of an automotive vehicle.
On the other hand, a bumper is usually mounted on a body of an automotive vehicle by bolting the former to the latter. However, when a bumper having distortion in its formed shape is to be mounted on a body having dimensional and/or positional errors in assembly has been required that more than one worker perform the mounting work while correcting deviation in the positional relationship between the members to be assembled, by force.
Therefore, the process of mounting a bumper on a body has required many hands of workers. If it is attempted to automate the assembling process, it is very difficult for a robot, which performs; accurate motion in a predetermined and unadaptable manner, or an automatic assembling machine, to effect the mounting work, due to possible distortion in the formed shape of the bumper and dimensional and/or positional errors in assembly of the car body, which has hitherto made it impossible to automatically mount the bumper on the car body.